


die by the sword

by dustyloves



Category: The Goldfinch (2019), The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Drugs, F/M, M/M, Mild Kink, d/s dynamics etc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-08-03
Packaged: 2020-07-30 15:01:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20099119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustyloves/pseuds/dustyloves
Summary: Boris looks no different than when Theo saw him last: same glittering black eyes, cynical twist of the mouth, hair falling in his face. In more ways than one, it feels as if the past eighteen months have been a dream, Theo only awakening now Boris is here.





	die by the sword

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [die by the sword](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20350540) by [Elizabethbitchprbbly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elizabethbitchprbbly/pseuds/Elizabethbitchprbbly)

'Your turn to go to Carrefour,' Boris says from the floor where he's sprawled like a smug cat, tilting his chin back and gazing at Theo upside down.  
  
Theo groans into the moth-eaten sofa cushion. It's Boxing Day at Boris's apartment in Antwerp. He's about two minutes from falling asleep, lulled by the soft sound of _Casablanca _on TV and the patter of rain on the windowsill, and he doesn't want to go anywhere, maybe ever again.  
  
'_Potter_,' Boris says. 'Am serious. We have a situation developing.'  
  
'Well, go and deal with it,' Theo says, a muffled whine.  
  
'An urgent, running-out-of-beer situation,' Boris continues as if he hasn't spoken.  
  
'That sounds like a problem for you.' Theo yawns. The rim of his glasses is digging into his cheek uncomfortably, but he's too weak to move to take them off.  
  
There's a long pause, and for one blissful moment, he thinks, in his sleep-addled mind, that the discussion is closed, that he's safe. He sighs, snuggling deeper into the sofa.  
  
Then 180-something lbs of Boris drops onto his back like a sack of bricks.  
  
'_Unnh_! Jesus Christ!'  
  
'Rise and shine, shithead!' Boris cackles.  
  
'What the fuck? Are you trying to break my spine?' Theo twists and flails, pinned with Boris' thighs on either side of his waist.  
  
'I said groceries! We need beer. And snacks maybe. Paluszki or nuts or something. Come on! Up, up!'  
  
Theo bucks like a rodeo bull, and finally, with an elbow jab to Boris's ribs, sends him tumbling to the floor.  
  
'_Blyad!_ You'll pay for that, you fuck,' Boris grumbles.  
  
'If you've got all this energy, why don't _you _go?'  
  
'Because it's your turn! And it's raining! Also, you have only a little cold—'  
  
'It's mild pneumonia, the doctor said.'  
  
'Right! Mild! Meanwhile, I'm sitting here with a _gunshot wound—_'  
  
'Ugh.' Now that the terror is over, Theo finally convinced that Boris' bullet-graze is minor and his arm isn't about to fall off, Boris has begun gently teasing him about his initial panic—not to mention attempting to use his own heroic rescue of the painting as leverage any opportunity he gets (which has actually worked a couple of times).  
  
'Come on, Potter.'  
  
'Fuck no.' To underline his point, Theo lays back down and swings his feet up on the armrest. Boris promptly springs up and pounces, pinching an exposed sliver of skin around Theo's waist hard enough to bruise; Theo yelps in outrage and goes to sock Boris in the jaw, only he's too slow, Boris catching his wrist. Theo tries to pull free, but Boris tightens his grip like a vice, a manic grin spreading over his face.  
  
He's... strong. Which Theo knows. There's a reason, besides his watchful gaze, the scar over his eye and the track marks on his arm, that Grisha called Boris a guy you wouldn't want to get into a fight with: though he's still lean and wiry, panther-like, he's filled out in his chest and shoulders, and right now, Theo's wrist clenched in his fist, Boris's bicep is flexing impressively, the cord of muscle along the length of his forearm standing out sharp. He's still grinning, wide, toothy and slightly unhinged, a lock of dark hair falling into his face. He's braced above Theo, his legs are pressed along Theo's legs, and Theo experiences a brief but powerful sense memory—  
  
humid night, vodka burn in the throat, on the floor in Boris's living room, _'Boris, what—?'—'Hey, it's okay, shhhh,'_ rolling hips, rough scrape of denim, shivering, feverish, at the heat of the gasping mouth at his neck—  
  
Did Boris's smile just falter? Is he remembering too?  
  
Theo lands an upper cut hard in Boris's stomach, knocking the wind out of him—'Whuh,' Boris says, curling inward in shock—and jerks his hand free.  
  
'Fine,' says Theo, rolling off the couch and walking into the hall, grabbing his coat from the hook. 'I'll go, but you have to come with me. The last time I got lost and I couldn't find anything in the store and then the checkout girl started asking me some shit in Dutch and I didn't understand a fucking thing.'  
  
'Fine,' echoes Boris, and rushes ahead of him to hold the door open, oddly courteous.  
  
That night is the night they watch _It's A Wonderful Life_, and Boris shoots dope while Theo watches and tries not to be jealous because he has to fly to NYC tomorrow, and he's too sick anyway, even if he did want to, which he doesn't, because, as he tells Boris, it's stupid. They nod off together on the couch. When Theo wakes up in the night, he's in Boris's arms, nose pressed into Boris's neck, the slow thud of Boris's heartbeat in his ears.  
  
-  
  
Theo doesn't hear from Boris in the year and a half he's on the road buying back Hobie's changelings, but he thinks of him often. Sometimes, lonely in hotel rooms in the wee hours of morning, drunk on minibar gin and nostalgia, he'll compose texts: _SOS Iceberg is on TV right now and I just got to the bit with the polar bears. I found cherry piroshki at a street market outside the airport—please explain why this is better than a jelly donut. Have you seen Drive (Ryan Gosling)? I liked it but maybe I'm just high. _Sometimes he even sends them, though he knows it's pointless, that Boris has almost certainly changed his number by now, and he can't expect a reply. Still, when he returns home, he texts Boris' number—_Back in NYC—_just in case.  
  
Despite Hobie's protests, Theo goes back to work the day after he gets back; in his absence, the shop has only been open a couple days a week, and they're already behind. He falls into a routine quickly: up at eight, working until five, dinner—with Hobie, sometimes guests, or the Barbours—at six. He doesn't go out much, feeling safer from his worst impulses under Hobie's eye, in the quiet of the shop, its dim, dusty light, surrounded by chairs and tables and cabinets in warm, sumptuous, honey-coloured wood—everything old and beautiful, reminding him of what matters. He's sober, apart from a glass or two of wine at dinner, the occasional digestif whisky or cognac. He feels calmer, his head clearer, and although his insomnia persists, a brutal nightly torment (tossing in sweaty sheets, turning the pillow over and over, chest tightening in panic as his thoughts turn to Hobie's face the morning he returned from Antwerp, _it was really inappropriate for you to give Pippa that necklace, please tell me all this other business has nothing to do with you_, to Kitsey calling him a drug addict, to his dad forcing him to call Mr Bracegirdle for a loan, face shining with sweat and desperation; and then, invariably, back to the day of the museum, how snappy and irritable he'd been that morning, teenage, bratty, sulking for no reason, as if, back then, he knew what pain really was. '_Don't think about that, don't think about that_,' he'd find himself chanting aloud in his darkened bedroom, hands over his ears as if he could block out thoughts that way), when he finally falls asleep, exhausted, it's deep and all-consuming. If he has bad dreams, he doesn't remember them.  
  
Things are stable, life predictable even in misery. Until Pippa comes back from London, on a 'break' from her relationship with Everett, and she and Theo begin sleeping together. And Theo's life, after that, becomes dislodged from any sense of normality, floating unanchored, disconnected, dangerous.  
  
The first time, they've been drinking at a hipster bar, dangly pendant lights and artisanal cocktails in mason jars. Pippa explains how it happened: Everett under stress at work—Theo bites his tongue against the comment he wants to make ('at work at the _music library_?')—facing a grievance procedure, all his colleagues turning against him; Pippa was sympathetic, did what she could to support him; in the midst of the upheaval, she'd been triggered and had a serious panic attack; Everett felt forced to look after her when he was the one who wanted looking after; he'd said, _I just need space to deal with this shit_, and sent her packing.  
  
'He doesn't understand,' Theo says. 'What you went through.'  
  
'He understands better than you'd think,' Pippa says. 'He has trauma in his life too. I mean, that's the crux of it. It's too much for me to expect him to be strong all the time.'  
  
'Sure,' says Theo, and changes the subject. When they arrive back at their rooms, Pippa says, dryly, with a hint of resignation: 'So, shall we?' And they do.  
  
Pippa fucks the way she laughs, all reckless, delirious joy, as if in the very act she's defying death. She blushes the color of rosé from neck to chest, eyes closed, head thrown back, arching her spine and tugging wildly at her own mane of fiery hair. Theo might as well be anyone, a doll made of plastic and silicone. This does not offend him. How could it? It's too mind-meltingly sexy. Who knew Pippa, always so polite, so generous and kind, contained this secret streak of searing, selfish desire, delicious meanness that has her raking sharp nails down Theo's back, sinking teeth into Theo's shoulder? Well, maybe Theo did know it in his bones: something about the intensity of her thwarted musical ambitions, how she always seemed to think she needed to protect Theo by rejecting him. Maybe all along Pippa was a wildfire, and Theo only never saw it because she looked like so deceptively like a pretty, fine-spun fawn-girl.  
  
As good as it is, it's not enough. It's so much like getting what he wants, but it's not, and instead of the dizzy, heightened, obsessive-crush-feeling subsiding, it escalates. Anything Pippa says or does—a glance, a sigh, the wording of a text—has the power to hurl him into a state of high anxiety and distress for days and (sleepless) nights. Against all reason and good sense, he finds himself scheming, thoughts like _there must be a way to make her love me _unfurling in his mind unbidden. Though he still won't touch opiates (for now: if he so much as thinks the words 'ever again', he panics, seeing too clearly the dark empty chasm of life without ahead of him, and is immediately overcome with the urge to relapse), he has his psychiatrist prescribe him some Xanax, and swallows them by the handful, leaving his mouth rancid and bitter.  
  
This is how Boris finds him.  
  
-  
  
Theo's ringing up a sale, a mahogany arch-top mantel clock for a nervy young woman with dangly hoop earrings. She's telling him all about a similar one her grandmother has at her house in the UK, when the front door opens. Theo doesn't look up at first, until he notices that the figure at the periphery of his vision is standing stock still.  
  
'Oh, hi,' he blurts, unable to stop himself from interrupting the woman, who luckily doesn't seem to mind, twisting around curiously to see who he's talking to. Boris wiggles his eyebrows, flashes a wolfish smile.  
  
Theo is barely aware of finishing the sale, heart thumping, a tremor in his hands. As soon as door falls shut behind the woman, he turns and says, half-accusatory, 'What are you doing here?', automatically spreading his arms as Boris approaches.  
  
Boris's hug is thorough and bone-crushing. He smells of tobacco, and Theo has to stop himself from sighing into it; it's like trying to take a sip of water when you're dehydrated and accidentally gulping half the bottle. Boris' hand cradles the back of his head tenderly, like he's a baby, and he should probably be insulted on some level, but it feels too good.  
  
'Got your text,' Boris says, as he pulls back.  
  
'My text from six months ago?'  
  
'Well, I had things to do,' Boris says reasonably. 'I know you think I just sit around all day pining and waiting for a text from you, Potter, but I have life.'  
  
'But you never replied.'  
  
'Oh—' Boris makes a sound like _pfffft_. 'You know how it is. In the middle of something, see text, going to write back but forget. Point is, I'm here now. Where's good for a drink?'  
  
They end up in a bar a few blocks away, Theo's first choice on nights he's too wound up to sleep, an oddball lived-in place with the look and feel of a second-hand bookstore, lit by bell-shaped damask table lamps in ivory and coral, armchairs with throws and cushions covered in tassels and chintz, bookshelves on every wall bursting with old Victorian novels, valuable first and second editions sometimes. Boris looks around incredulously.  
  
'Shut up,' Theo says pre-emptively.  
  
He holds up his hands. 'I am saying nothing.'  
  
They slide into a booth and order a beer and a glass of vodka each. '_Sto lat_,' Boris says solemnly. Their vodka glasses meet with a clink, and each take a healthy gulp.  
  
Boris looks no different than when Theo saw him last: same glittering black eyes, cynical twist of the mouth, hair falling in his face. In more ways than one, it feels as if the past eighteen months have been a dream, Theo only awakening now Boris is here.  
  
'I'm just an hour off the plane from Hamburg,' he's saying. 'Well—little layover in Manchester. I was thinking, no point getting room for the night when up again at four, I'll just go to a pub. Only I met this guy Alexej from Czech—really interesting guy, he was working in the bar and he told me lots of stories of when he lived on a cruise ship—his wife is a psychic, a real one, she read my aura, you would have liked her—anyway, I stayed in their flat and he drove me to the airport.'  
  
'Is Hamburg where you live now?'  
  
'Technically no. Still traveling around, working. Still have the little place in Antwerp. But I was staying there while I did a favor for a friend.'  
  
'Oh?'  
  
Boris laughs. 'I think the less you know, the better you sleep.' His gaze sharpens subtly. 'It's all sorted now, with your furniture?'  
  
'Yes.'  
  
He leans in. 'And with the redhead?'  
  
Grimacing, Theo explains.  
  
Boris whoops in approval, too loud for the graveyard silence of the empty bar. 'Well—I see no problem here! A win-win!'  
  
'Except—'  
  
'Except?'  
  
'She doesn't love me.'  
  
Boris throws his hands up in exaggerated disbelief. 'Oh, Fyodor. I see you have not changed at all.'  
  
'That's—'  
  
'I am not saying it's a bad thing.' His eyes crinkle sympathetically, which Theo hates. 'In a way, beautiful, to have such a pure and kindly soul, with such capacity for sensitivity and love despite the odds—despite the poor girl all but begging you not to! But also tragic when you think of all those starving for such care and attention, and you spending all yours on one who does not even want or deserve it!'  
  
'It's not like I can just turn it off,' Theo says, highly irritated.  
  
Boris drains the last of his beer. 'Of course not,' he says, agreeably, then slants a look at Theo, one he recognises from high school that back then meant _let's sneak off somewhere and smoke some weed_. 'Want to come to the bathroom with me?'  
  
Theo hesitates. But it's been so long; he's been so good.  
  
'Sure,' he says.  
  
-  
  
'Shit,' Theo says a couple hours later, face flushed, heart skittering in his chest. 'I've got to meet Hobie and Pippa for dinner.'  
  
'So?' Boris demands. 'Tell them you have a guest of honour. I'd like to meet them properly. We can all go for dinner on me.'  
  
'But—' Theo starts, and can't think of a rebuttal. Truthfully, his anxiety is skyrocketing at the idea of the four of them sitting around a table together making small-talk. It's not as though Hobie doesn't know who Boris is, and (in broad strokes) what he and Theo have done, but it's another thing to confront Hobie with the reality of it in such a stark and unavoidable way.  
  
'C'mon,' says Boris. 'You don't trust me? You don't think I can be nice?'  
  
'It's not that,' Theo says, though partly it is. 'I just—'  
  
'Pick a restaurant they like and call them. I'll go back to my hotel, get changed, and meet you there,' Boris commands, with cocaine-induced imperiousness.  
  
'I—sure,' Theo says, defeated. Their voices have been rising louder and louder, the waitress circling closer to their booth, hawk-eyed and suspicious, every time she makes the rounds. It was a mistake to bring Boris somewhere Theo actually likes. Better they leave now, before he disgraces himself so badly he can never come back.  
  
-  
  
Dinner goes off better than expected—marvelously, maybe, although that could be the champagne making the lights in the restaurant wink, merry and warm. It's all Mediterranean food, antipasto and olives, bread drizzled in oil, roasted courgettes, sun-dried tomatoes, pasta and fine cuts of meat, though Theo, nervous and coked-up, can barely eat a bite. Boris is on the charm offensive, bending to kiss the back of Pippa's hand (Pippa laughs nervously and cuts a look at Theo like, _is this guy for real_?, to which Theo can only shrug, because the answer is, as always, both yes and no), shaking Hobie's firmly, asking respectful questions about the shop, about how it all began, about Welty, lavishing compliments—'I am glad Potter here has you,' he says seriously at one point, forcing Theo to cringe and look at the floor in mortification; 'He always said a kind of fate brought him to your door. Thank you for taking care of him.'—regaling them with stories of interesting things he has seen on his 'travels', the details kept carefully vague, as if maybe Boris spent the last decade doing missionary work, or performing in the circus.  
  
'We must thank you, too,' Hobie says. When Theo looks up, his eyes on Boris are soft and sincere. 'For looking out for Theo when we weren't there. From what I hear, you may have saved his life a few times.'  
  
'Me? Save _Potter's _life? Hah!' Boris scoffs. 'I did nothing, really. _I _am the one who owes a life debt.'  
  
Theo freezes, but Hobie seems to take this as one of Boris's Russianate exaggerations, and presses on. 'Regardless, all of us here in New York are grateful to you for being a friend to him during those years. A friendship like yours is a rare and precious thing, something most of us long for but few ever experience in our lifetimes.' He raises a glass. All three of them drink.  
  
The coffee and the digestifs are brought out, the night drags on, Theo wants more blow but can't figure out how to ask for it with Hobie and Pippa here, and the weight of everything they can't talk about is a strain, even though Boris himself is doing beautifully and appears perfectly relaxed. It's a relief when Hobie rises to his feet.  
  
'Thank you for a beautiful meal, Mr Pavlikovsky,' he says, 'but time is getting on, and I'm afraid I don't bear the late nights as well as I used to—'  
  
'It is an honour to finally have a proper meeting with you after all these years!' Boris cries, leaping to his feet. To Theo's astonishment, when Boris opens his arms for an embrace, Hobie accepts, patting his back awkwardly.  
  
'I'll see you in the morning, Theo,' Hobie says, with a slight edge to his tone, as if to say: _I had better.  
  
_'See you,' Theo says dutifully, and Hobie departs.  
  
'I should probably be going, too,' Pippa says. Boris's attention shifts to her, laser-focused, a palpable change in the air, and she actually blushes, which makes Theo feel—something.  
  
'But—so soon! I feel I have barely had a moment with you! And I have so much I want to know—so much Theo has told me! Why not come for a drink? Just a half an hour, nothing more—I know a place not far from here—and then we can be sending you on your way—'  
  
He need hardly have exerted the verbal effort. As he leans in closer, dipping his head to Pippa's level, then looking up through his lashes with an earnest, shining gaze, Pippa immediately relents, a hesitant, bashful smile hovering on her lips. The whole tableau—two bent together, inches between them, one red head, one dark, melting brown eyes meeting black obsidian—makes the bottom fall out of Theo's stomach. Is it envy? Fury? What does it mean if he's getting kind of hard?  
  
'Well, just for a half an hour,' she says.  
  
-  
  
'What do you drink, you drink vodka?'  
  
Strobing lights, thumping house music. It's still early, the dance floor empty, but there are a few people strewn about the white leather sofas, girls in mini-dresses with shimmering fake-tan legs, boys with Rolex watches and tattoos snaking down their arms, and now Theo and Boris flanking Pippa, who's a little wide-eyed, though when Theo touches her elbow and mouths _are you OK_?, she gives him a reassuring smile.  
  
'Um, just wine,' Pippa half-bellows over the music.  
  
'I mean like shots!'  
  
'Oh. Then sure. Vodka's fine.'  
  
Boris takes off for the bar, and Theo and Pippa find a secluded corner, couches clustered around a table with a flickering LED candle.  
  
'Sorry about this,' Theo says, waving a hand behind him to encompass the glowing neon-blue bar, bartenders spinning glasses and tossing cocktail shakers. 'Just say if you want to go.'  
  
'Theo, I'm _fine_,' Pippa says. 'I want to stay.' So Theo bites his tongue.  
  
Boris returns with the drinks (vodka, beer, a large white wine for Pippa). 'Vodka is tradition for us,' he explains to her. 'Ever since we were little kids. Potter used to come over to my house after school, get so drunk he couldn't put on shoes.'  
  
Theo scowls.  
  
'This was in Vegas?' Pippa asks.  
  
'Not much else to do in the desert.' Boris raises his glass. '_Sto lat!_'  
  
-  
  
'You know, it's funny how you guys disappeared for a minute, and now suddenly you're awake and all sobered up,' Pippa observes.  
  
Boris raises his eyebrows. 'And?'  
  
'I'm just saying that _if _you happened to be taking anything, it would _really_ impolite not to offer me some. Not just impolite, actually. _Unchivalrous_.'  
  
Theo and Boris exchange a look. Boris shrugs, and passes Pippa the glassine bag under the table. Pippa smirks in triumph.  
  
'Leave some for us!' Boris calls as she gets up, and then, turning back to Theo, says: 'I get it, sort of.'  
  
'What?'  
  
'She has a bite to her. Not all sugar princess like that other girl. But, I am thinking, you are too much alike. Both sad in the same way, carrying sorrow like the cross.'  
  
'Yeah,' Theo says morosely. 'That's exactly what she said.' He takes a gulp of beer, then says in a burst: 'But it's just not fucking fair. So this thing happened to me when I was thirteen, I lost my family, I'm miserable, therefore now I'm—what? Locked out of society? Barred from any chance at happiness, being in a relationship, being normal? Too broken for ninety per cent of women? Even the ones who say they're okay with dealing with my shit—things will be good for a while, until something happens and they see how fucked-up I really am and want to bolt; or _they _say something and I realize just how little I can relate to them, how far away they are—God, it's like a different galaxy. And all along, right in front of me, there's the one girl who I _know_ understands, who went through the same things, who feels the same way. And everything is right! It's easy, the love is there, we never run out of things to say to each other. But according to her, it can't possibly be that simple.' He draws breath, about to go on, but catches sight of Pippa re-emerging from the bathroom door and stops short.  
  
Boris, who has been watching him intently, reaches and places a hand on his shoulder, firm and steadying. 'This is nothing,' he says. 'All in here.' With his free hand, he raps his knuckles lightly on the side of Theo's head. 'Soon, the problem will take care of itself. Is it painful, waiting? Yes, but you have endured worse. In the meantime, you need not to think so much. And maybe get laid! Serious,' he adds. 'It can't be that good with her, if you're still agonizing like this.'  
  
'What's going on?' Pippa is looking between them.  
  
Boris gives Theo's shoulder a final squeeze, and lets his hand drop. 'Nothing, _myshka._ Where would you like to go next?'  
  
-  
  
Boris hasn't brought Gyuri along to New York this time, though he assures Theo he's fine and still working for Boris, only he won't explain exactly why he isn't here, something vague about how he's 'taking some time'. They hop into a cab instead and Boris gives the driver a street name.  
  
'This isn't that weird Russian club out in Queens, is it?' Theo says. 'Because I don't know if Pippa would appreciate—'  
  
'_No_,' Boris says with indignant hauteur. 'Polish club in East Village.'  
  
Pippa cackles, flinging her head back against the leather seat. She's wasted, cheeks glowing pink. Boris offers her a flask from the inside of his coat, and she takes it and drinks deep.  
  
'No faith in me,' Boris tells her. 'Always assuming the worst.' Then to Theo: 'C'mon, Potter! It's a nice place. Lighten up!'  
  
'Yeah, lighten up, Potter!' crows Pippa. Theo is beginning to think it was a really bad idea to introduce them. He takes a drink and a bump.  
  
The club turns out to be a charming if shabby lounge bar with some kind of open-mic night happening in the cellar, and Theo is forced to admit it's not bad at all, the kind of place he'd have taken Pippa himself if he'd thought of it, jolly and warm, unusual Polish pilsners and an extensive wine menu. Boris buys a bottle of riesling and teaches Pippa how to say _dziękuję bardzo _to the waiter, and they go downstairs and suffer through an excruciating hour of stand-up comedy and spoken-word poetry. The other patrons seem to be mostly performers themselves, sweating in polyester button-up shirts, scribbling in spiral notebooks; the rest are in loud, drunken groups, talking amongst themselves, seeming barely to listen apart from to heckle. Pippa and Theo make startled eye contact during a truly appalling poem read by a gruff man in his forties off a crumpled sheet of paper, his voice shaking throughout:  
  
_The raindrops shooting down_  
_Like arrows_  
_I looked across the water_  
_Endless_  
_Impossible to know  
_ _Like the one I thought I loved—  
  
_At the end, Boris claps and cheers, his eyes bright with something suspiciously like genuine emotion.  
  
'You can't be serious,' Theo says in an undertone.  
  
'Why not?' Boris says, defiant. 'As if you have the onions to go up there? You think you can do better?'  
  
Theo has nothing to say.  
  
-  
  
'You just relinquished your right to choose where we go,' Theo says as they stagger out onto the sidewalk. 'That was your last chance. You blew it.'  
  
Pippa laughs, but guiltily, as if unwilling to take sides.  
  
'Oi! You're telling me you didn't have a good time?' Boris says, but he's smiling, and he throws one arm around Theo, the other around Pippa; with each of them so drunk and unsteady they're a liability, barrelling along the street. It's warm in the crook of Boris' arm, and Theo breathes in the scent of his cologne and feels a rush of calm, the nearness of him just as much a comfort now as it was on those bad nights in Vegas when he'd awaken in the throes of terror, choking on imaginary dust and rubble.  
  
'Shall we go to a diner?' Theo says. 'Or we could go back home—'  
  
Boris is already making an unimpressed sound like _nnnnyeh_.  
  
'I think I have a bottle of Scotch tucked away somewhere—'  
  
'Maybe—' Pippa starts to say.  
  
'Boring, Potter, boring!' Boris says. 'The night is still so young! Everywhere is still open—look at all the neon signs! Listen, why don't I call up this pal of mine—'  
  
'Hey, you stupid motherfuckers, I'm trying to talk!' Pippa hollers.  
  
Boris and Theo both fall silent, exchanging quick, delighted looks at the sudden advent of sweary, slurring Pippa.  
  
'I said, _I_ know a place!'  
  
-  
  
_A place_ turns out to be a bar, a retro-style grindhouse cinema, and a cool, druggy house party all in one. The bouncer lights up with a smile at the sight of Pippa, who greets him by name, and he gives them each a stamp on the back of the hand, and leads them down a flight of stairs underground, through a small bar, into a wide, darkened room, a film—_The Last House On The Left—_projected on the wall. Instead of seats, the floor is covered in mattresses and cushions; people recline on them like ancient Greeks. In the pale flickering light, couples are making out with abandon; others are drinking and chatting lazily; some are sleeping; one woman, to whom Theo's eye is drawn on account of the strikingly familiar glazed look on her face, is still holding a syringe loosely in her hand as she slumps against the wall.  
  
'Did _you _know about this place?' Theo asks Boris.  
  
Boris shakes his head wonderingly.  
  
Pippa is already making herself comfortable on the floor, propping cushions under her elbows. 'You know how it is with insomnia,' she says. 'Whenever I'm in the city, I end up spending a lot of time walking around at night by myself, looking for places to go. Riding the subway anywhere. I walked past this place a hundred times not knowing what it was. Pretty good, huh?' She makes a 'gimme' motion to Boris, who obediently deposits the flask in her hand.  
  
'Genius,' he pronounces, falling back on the mattress with a soft _flump_. Theo kneels on Pippa's other side.  
  
None of them really watch the movie except to hoot and jeer whenever something particularly gory happens. Mostly they drink, and sniff, and talk, and smoke cigarettes (because nobody around, staff or patron, seems likely to care).  
  
'You're not what I imagined you would be,' Pippa's saying to Boris, taking a drag, coughing weakly, and passing his cigarette back. 'Theo talks about you all the time, always has done ever since he came back to New York years ago. If a story began with "One time, Boris and I...", you knew it was going to be a good one—'  
  
'Well, what can I say?' Boris preens. 'I make a big impression.'  
  
'Don't flatter yourself, you dick,' says Theo.  
  
'Did you really live in Theo's bedroom for weeks without getting found out?'  
  
'It wasn't a secret so much as a fact I just tried to let Xandra forget as much as possible,' Theo corrects.  
  
'The way Theo always described you, it was like you were this mythic boy-hero, like Peter Pan mixed with the Artful Dodger and Gavroche, you know? And also a bit of Robin Hood in there too, maybe—'  
  
Theo's face is burning.  
  
'So in my head, I still pictured you like that. I don't know why I thought after ten years, you would still be a starving Dickensian orphan-looking-kid in rags, but—the first time we met, at the engagement party, you said your name was Boris but it didn't really click who you were, not even after the fact. Like not only are you a grown man, every time I've seen you, you've been dressed—' She tugs the sleeve of Boris's crisp Armani shirt.  
  
'I have a very good tailor now in Antwerp,' Boris says modestly. The smugness is radiating off him in waves; Theo can't stand it. 'And, well. If I am being honest, I am having questions about you too. Potter always scribbling away in school books, on the back of dad's baccarat papers, always writing to Pippa, Pippa, Pippa. I am thinking, who is Pippa? Who is so important that when he is here with me, he is really somewhere else?'  
  
'I never got any letters,' Pippa says, after a confused pause.  
  
'I only sent a few,' Theo explains, embarrassed. 'Hobie wrote me saying he'd been told to pass on the message from your aunt that you were too sick to write back.'  
  
'Bitch,' Pippa says unexpectedly, and Theo huffs a shocked laugh. 'Not that I—it wasn't her fault, but I was _so _lonely. I felt so broken and alone and like I'd just been _ripped _out of the only place I belonged and I was desperate for any little reminder of the life I had before. I mean, there are worse things, obviously, than having to move away and go to boarding school in beautiful Switzerland and not getting to be a professional flutist—boo hoo hoo, right? But when I look back, it's like before the museum I was a whole person and after I was just a million fragments that never fully came together. I tried to start over, I tried to make new friends, to find something new to live for, but I was always faking it. God. I think it would have really helped me to hear from you back then.'  
  
Theo, wanting to get closer to Pippa but not sure what's allowed, reaches and sets his hand next to hers, their pinkie fingers brushing.  
  
'I don't think that is so _boo hoo hoo_,' Boris says. 'Tough thing, being young, having a home and then not. Me and my dad—we would never live in any place longer than a year or two. Anywhere we stayed, I knew we could not stay a long time. I knew this at time when we arrived, but knowing did not protect me. I had to do it over and over, but did this make it easier? Fuck, no.' He stubs out the cigarette and drops the butt in somebody's dirty beer glass. 'Think this pain is not something we can help. Deep down we are all just like animals looking for safe place to sleep.'  
  
On screen, a man wielding a chainsaw is chasing David Hess through a living room. Theo tips the flask upside down, but only a couple of drops of vodka land on his tongue. He checks his phone. It's after three in the morning; he's still wired.  
  
'We're dry,' he says. 'Do you want something from the bar?'  
  
'Usual,' Boris says, waving a lordly hand, shades of _Withnail and I_: _we want the finest wines available to humanity.  
  
_Theo gets up, winding between bodies on the floor.  
  
It takes a while at the bar. The two bartenders are deep in conversation when Theo arrives, and look none too pleased at the interruption, one of them rolling her eyes as she disappears into the back to fetch the bottle of Stolichnaya. Still, it can't be more than ten minutes later when Theo returns, balancing a tray of shots, beers, and wine, to the sight of Boris and Pippa sharing a kiss, slow and sweet.  
  
Theo doesn't gasp, or drop the tray. He just freezes and stares.  
  
They're side by side, turned towards one another. Boris's hand cups Pippa's jaw, thumb stroking the delicate shell of her ear. His brow is furrowed, dark lashes fluttering, a strange, almost painful expression on his face. Theo can't see much more than the back of Pippa's lovely red head, but she's holding onto Boris by his shirt collar, and as Theo watches, her body sinks towards Boris's, magnetized.  
  
That's when Boris's dark eyes snap open to meet Theo's. Abruptly, he jerks back, caught.  
  
'No, no, it's okay,' Theo hears himself say. His heart is hammering hard enough to hurt, eyes stinging. He swallows, and swallows again. 'Don't worry about me. It's fine. Look, I think I'm just gonna—'  
  
He sets the drinks down on the floor, then straightens up.  
  
'I'll see you tomorrow,' he says, unable to bring himself to look at Pippa's face.  
  
'_Potter_!'  
  
Boris scrambles after him, but Theo doesn't slow down, great sweeping strides through the bar, up the stairs two at a time, then out onto the sidewalk, cars rushing past, and God, he's grateful for the cool air in his lungs.  
  
Boris jogs to catch up. 'Look, am sorry, it just happened—'  
  
'Fuck you, Boris,' Theo snaps, still walking. 'Don't fucking talk to me right now.'  
  
'Is not like what you think—'  
  
'I don't care. I said, don't talk to me.'  
  
When Boris persists, scurrying along beside him, babbling—'Potter, please listen to me, something you need to know'—Theo finally does stop.  
  
'Look, I get it, you're sorry, but that doesn't really help me not want to smash your fucking face in right now, okay? So please just leave me alone.'  
  
'I will,' Boris says breathlessly. 'But just one thing.'  
  
Theo scoffs, snarls, '_What_?'  
  
And Boris grabs him, both sides of his face—a dizzying echo, he's fifteen years old again, jittery, heartbroken—and kisses him hard. But this time is not like then, not a brief, urgent last goodbye; when Theo gasps and reels a little, Boris tugs him back in and kisses him again, now with tongue and teeth, right in the middle of the street. His stubble is prickly against Theo's cheek; at the flicker of his tongue against Theo's lips, Theo opens his mouth without thinking, lets him in, feels Boris inhale sharply—with desire, Theo realises. _Fuck_.  
  
Boris pulls away, but only slightly, their foreheads touching. 'That was it,' he says, voice barely above a whisper. Theo tries to suppress a shiver. 'Last thing I wanted you to know. I'll go now.'  
  
He leaves Theo trembling where he stands, streetlights blurring in his vision.  
  
-  
  
Theo manages a meager twenty minutes of sleep before work and wakes up on the brink of a panic attack, chest bursting. _Taking deep breaths causes an imbalance of oxygen and carbon dioxide, which can make the panic worse_, his shrink explained once, so he tries to exhale slowly and remember the mantra she taught him: _I am safe, this fear is only a feeling, it will soon pass._ As the terror and agony subsides, he feels vaguely ashamed that her valuable therapeutic advice is being put to use mainly on cocaine comedowns, but whatever.  
  
_Sorry for taking off last night. Did you make it home OK? _he texts Pippa.  
  
_home? yes. OK? debatable. _she texts back, followed by a selfie from the bathroom, sitting on the floor next to the toilet bowl, eyes smudged with mascara, giving the camera a sardonic thumbs-up.  
  
_Hungover?   
  
__you said it. i will never drink vodka again._  
_just typing the word vodka right then made me gag._  
_this normal for you and B?  
  
_The affectionate familiarity of 'B' makes something twist in Theo's gut.  
  
_No black outs or black eyes = tame for us.  
  
__lol. jesus.  
  
__Can I bring you aspirin?  
  
__nah but thanks. xxx  
  
_-  
  
Theo's sweaty and exhausted and it feels like his head is splitting, and what's more, there's a horde of clamoring British tourists in the shop, none of whom have any intention of buying a fucking thing, loudly parading their (dubious) knowledge of antiques, demanding Theo unlock the glass cabinets so that they can paw over the curiosities and ornaments, careless and clumsy.  
  
But it's fine. More than fine: Theo is grateful. It's easier to focus on the dull ache of a hangover, the banal frustrations of work, than on the question of what to do now he knows his best friend is in love with him.  
  
-  
  
He expects Boris will simply show up at the shop unannounced like he usually does, cheerful, as if nothing happened, waiting by the cash register, hands shoved in his overcoat pockets, promising some grand plan for the night, _hurry up Potter, I've got something to show you. _Five o'clock comes and goes. Theo even keeps the shop open half an hour late, making a big production of sweeping and dusting and 'forgetting' to turn the sign around, until Hobie comes out from the back and says he and Pippa are having vegetarian enchiladas for dinner, and would Theo like some?  
  
There's no sign of him for the rest of the week either, and Theo starts getting concerned. When he tells Pippa this one night, sipping after-dinner coffee in the kitchen, she looks up from the NYT crossword with a knowing glint in her eye.  
  
'The two of you are so sweet,' she says.  
  
'What?'  
  
'You have a beautiful relationship. Well. Apart from the obviously unhealthy and chaotic tendencies. It's lovely to see.'  
  
'Right,' says Theo, nonplussed. 'Anyway, I can't get in touch with him because he never checks his phone, and I have no idea what hotel he's staying at because he's always so fucking vague about everything.'  
  
'I think you should text him anyway,' says Pippa. 'After you made that big scene and stormed out—'  
  
'I didn't make a—'  
  
'He probably thinks you're still angry at him, so he'll be too shy to reach out to you first.'  
  
Theo can't figure out how to tell Pippa how supremely unlikely it is that Boris has developed the quality of _shyness _in his twenty-seventh year of life on the planet of Earth, nor that he's mainly worried in case Boris has got himself tangled up in some horrifying gang warfare situation and is now bleeding out in an alleyway somewhere, so he stays silent.  
  
'That kiss wasn't anything, you know,' she says.  
  
Theo looks up. She's set her pen down now the better to gaze at him, very still and serene, ankles crossed neatly under the table.  
  
'I was drunk and messy and coming on to him, but he kept telling me no. He was very nice about it, too. Like—' She attempts a truly dreadful imitation of Boris's Slavic accent. '"_Myshka_, you are a beautiful girl, look like painting by Rossetti, but Potter and I have friendship forged in fire, and I can never betray." So I started doing a bit where I was haggling, and he got it down to one kiss, which he agreed to—one _little _kiss, he said, but of course, with me being so trashed, I was pushing it as far as possible. That was when you walked in. Just bad timing, you know? Anyhow, if there's anyone you should be mad at, it's not him. It's me.'  
  
'"_I can never betray_,"' Theo repeats, after a beat. 'What kind of bullshit is that.' A mini-montage flashes through his mind: in Vegas, Boris taking sides with his dad and Xandra, ditching him for Kotku; in Amsterdam, Theo emerging from the hotel bathroom to the sight of Boris loading a gun. 'Boris would probably sell me out to the mafia for, like, a bag of chips.'  
  
Pippa uncrosses her ankles, leans across the table intently. 'What I'm saying is don't project your issues with me onto him, Theo. You know full well I've been treating you terribly.'  
  
Alarm bells start ringing in Theo's head.  
  
'Ever since the break-up, I've just been taking and taking from everyone,' she says. Her brown eyes are sparkling with tears. 'Crashing at Hobie's for months because I'm too depressed to look for an apartment, sleeping the days away. I haven't even glanced at any job vacancies. And you got landed with the worst of it. I've always known how you felt about me, but that didn't stop me from using you. Actually, that's _why _I chose you. Because I knew it would be easy.'  
  
_No, _he thinks, _n__o, no—  
  
_'You didn't use me,' Theo blurts, panicking. 'We're friends. I wanted to be there for you. And—I wanted it.'  
  
Pippa shakes her head, and a tear falls to her cheek, picturesque, a movie scene.  
  
'I'm so sorry,' she says. 'I will make this up to you somehow, someday. I promise.'  
  
'There's nothing to make up for.'  
  
She reaches across the table, takes both his hands in hers, and squeezes them. 'We've got to stop this.'  
  
'No, we don't.'  
  
'I'm sorry,' she repeats, and her voice is firm even as the tears pour down.  
  
That's how Theo knows it's over.  
  
-  
  
Theo cries, then washes down a couple of Xanax with half a bottle of sauvignon blanc. It helps, a little, easing the sting of the fresh wound. Lying in bed, he tries to watch TV on his laptop, but everything sets his teeth on edge. Then he decides to take Pippa's advice and text Boris.  
  
His vision is doubling, so he has to squint at his phone screen with one eye closed and really focus to hit the right letters in the right order.  
  
_Hope you are OK. I thought I would have heard from you by now. Please don't be dead in an alley somewhere. I'm not mad about the Pippa thing or anything else. I do want to see you though. I'll come to your hotel if you text me which one it is.  
  
_He tries to think of a sign-off, but can't, so hits send, throws his phone on the floor, and turns over to sleep, which comes mercifully quick.  
  
When he wakes up the next morning, still hazy, stretching out and scrabbling for his phone to check the time, he nearly drops it again when he sees there's a message.  
  
_Room 113 azure spring hotel delancey st! Going back to Germany tomorrow night but free today and hotel bar has vodka flavored like skittles))  
  
__-  
  
_Theo texts again before he leaves the shop, and again when he reaches the hotel, but to no avail; Boris checking his phone at the right time is clearly a once-in-a-blue-moon occurrence.  
  
The hotel lobby is busy, cacophony of echoing voices and the _ping _of elevator doors, tourists rolling suitcases along the artificial marble floor, long line from the front desk all the way to the entrance, three harried receptionists splitting it between them. Theo waits in the crowd for an elevator for about ten minutes before he notices a side door, and ducks through it into the stairwell.  
  
There's no response when he raps on the door of room 113, though he thinks he hears the floorboard creak, so he tries again, and says, 'Boris, are you in there? It's me—'  
  
Before he can finish, the door swings open, and Boris is beaming at him.  
  
'Potter! I was thinking maybe you aren't coming. Come in, look at my room! Nice, huh? One of the best in the place!' He shows Theo the smart TV, the expensive sound system, the remote control light switch. Theo nods along, says 'Wow' appropriately, but he's really looking at Boris, who's wearing only a tank top and a pair of tracksuit bottoms, feet bare and hair damp like he just got out of the shower, the least put-together Theo has seen him since they were kids, and oddly diminished and vulnerable for it. Though it may be Theo's imagination, he looks paler and more drawn than usual, the ever-present circles under his eyes dark as bruises.  
  
He decides not to ask. If it's about whatever's going on in Hamburg, Boris won't tell him. If it's about Theo, or... _feelings_, Boris definitely won't tell him.  
  
'Have you had dinner? Do you want to order pizza? Ha! Remember when in Vegas we would be phoning Dominos in the middle of the night and begging them to deliver?'  
  
'Oh, God. Remember when you pretended to cry and said you were starving and your dad had abandoned you? You were like—_please, anything you can spare—won't you find it in your hearts to help a child in need—!_'  
  
'_Please—haven't eaten in days! _Hey, wasn't so far from the truth! That lady answering the phone at Dominos had a heart of stone, I am telling you!' Boris pours large measures of Russian Standard into two lowball glasses, passes one to Theo. 'What a nightmare all that was. So grateful now to be grown up with own money, and able to get around!'  
  
'To adulthood,' Theo says fervently, raising his glass. No matter how difficult his life gets, nothing quite compares to being fifteen years old.  
  
'Adulthood. _N__a zdrowie__.'  
  
__-  
  
_From that point on, they get deliberately, steadily drunk.  
  
Theo thinks he knows why. It's in the way they're lounging on the pristine white hotel bed, side by side, Theo's socked foot occasionally brushing Boris's bare ankle; the way Boris's hand is resting on his own thigh, but every now and then it'll twitch, as if with the barely-suppressed urge to drag it between his legs, palm at his dick; the way Theo notices that tiny gesture, has that thought, and feels squirmy and nervous but also aroused; the way Boris lights Theo's cigarette for him even though he can very well do it himself; and finally, in the way Boris leans back against the pillows, gazes up at Theo through lazy, half-lidded eyes, and says, 'You never told me how the redhead was.'  
  
'You mean like—?' Theo's blushing; he can't help it.  
  
'Of course!' He waggles his eyebrows. 'I have to know what I'm missing out on, here.'  
  
'God. You're so gross for even asking that.'  
  
'Don't be prude, Potter.'  
  
'Sleazy, nasty, gross—' he's slurring.  
  
'Yah, yah, yah. So what was it like?'  
  
'Well—' He tries to think. 'She liked to be on top a lot.'  
  
'Mmm,' Boris says, at once appreciative and encouraging.  
  
'She would just get me in her room, rip my pants down and then straddle my lap and just go for it. Just sit on my dick and bounce. I would try to move, to, like, fuck her, and she'd grab my hips and dig in her nails and force me back down.'  
  
Boris is silent. Though he looks relaxed and sleepy against the pillows, Theo can tell from from his dark eyes and a certain charge in the air that he's keenly alert.  
  
'Sometimes she'd sit on my face, same kind of thing. I'd be trying to pull out some moves, you know, suck on her clit or something like that, and she'd literally slap me. Because that was against the rules. It wasn't what she wanted. She just wanted to grind against my wet mouth until she came. That was what she got off on—using me like I was a toy. Because it was more efficient for orgasms, I guess, but also the, like, power trip of it.'  
  
'Did—' Boris clears his throat. 'Did _you _like it?'  
  
'Yeah,' Theo says, his voice dropping to a murmur. He has an erection now: the memories, the booze, the sight of Boris watching him, hypnotized, chest rising and falling just a little too quickly to appear convincingly composed. '_Ugh_. Yeah. Nothing hotter. Just the sight of her on top of me, eyes shut, completely lost in her own world. Writhing. Me not being able to move, just having to lie there and take it.'  
  
He thinks he hears a very tiny, quiet gasp from Boris at that.  
  
'It would drive me crazy, and like—sometimes, because I didn't get to control the movement that much or touch myself, it would be really hard to come. So that turned into a game, too. If I could be good and still and not make a sound, she'd get me off. If not...'  
  
'_Jesus_,' Boris mutters on an exhale. His hand slides towards his crotch; he cups himself lightly. He must be desperate, Theo thinks: and with that realization, suddenly Theo is, too.  
  
He shifts closer to him on the bed. 'Yeah,' he says. 'If I was good, she would call me her pet—'  
  
Boris groans and squeezes his erection through his track pants, back arching.  
  
'If not, she'd get vicious. She'd ride my dick for hours, coming over and over again, just to watch me suffer. Keep going until I was begging.'  
  
'Theo,' Boris whispers. He never calls Theo his proper name, usually. 'I can't—'  
  
'Yeah,' says Theo, and seals his mouth on Boris's.  
  
Boris surges up into the kiss, gasping hotly against him as if he's been on edge for hours, hands snaking up Theo's shirt—God, Boris has great hands and now they're skimming up Theo's sides, his thumb flicking over Theo's nipple, making Theo's heart stutter, his breath catch. He stops to pull his shirt over his head, giving Boris better access; Boris's eyes drink him in greedily, before he follows suit, and then they're both shirtless, and when they kiss this time it's skin to skin, and the pleasure is shocking, blinding, even with the alcohol blurring the edges of sensation slightly—if anything, Theo's glad of it, certain that without that layer of insulating numbness, he'd already be coming in his pants. And there's something to be said too for the way the disparate elements of drunkenness, arousal and adrenaline are combining to generate a whole different kind of consciousness; it's like a spell has descended on the hotel room in a humid fog. Theo's possessed by liberating recklessness, like he's swallowed a sci-fi movie truth serum; he's never given less of a fuck in his life, and he's aware that the spell won't last, but that's part of what makes it work, why they've got to use it—the wild energy of it, foolhardy courage propelling them to do and say what they mean, but also the plausible deniability, the excuse for later, _crazy night, man, I don't remember a thing_.  
  
This is why Theo's hand is clenched in Boris's hair, and he's sucking a hickey under Boris's jaw, hedonistic like a teenager. It's why Boris is groaning nonsense in Polish and Russian and feeling Theo up shamelessly, his hands down the back of Theo's pants; Theo can remember a time he'd recoil at that, _ew, Boris, what the fuck are you doing_, but now he's all heat and nerve endings, and he gives a fitful little cry and jerks forward, pushing his dick against Boris's in his pants, God, why are there still so many clothes?, and Boris _squeezes_, hungry and claiming, but also a little like he can't believe Theo just made that sound and he's so overwhelmed he just has to hold onto something.  
  
'I think about this all the time,' Boris gasps: the spell has really done a number on him. 'All the fucking time. When I'm jerking off, it always comes back to this. Still think about Vegas—shitty drunk sex, but to think about it, I come in seconds.'  
  
'I think about it too,' Theo says, and it's true. For how fuzzy and confused his memories of those nights are, it's bizarre how much he remembers about Boris and him: desert heat, feeling of scratchy carpet against his cheek, shadows standing out in Boris's thin, hollow face in the low light; the sweat, the BO, the vodka and blood in his mouth; messy, sticky, teen-boy-scuzziness.  
  
They're grinding together arrhythmically, still with their pants on. It's inefficient and uncomfortable, but Theo has a feeling that's intentional, too, because once they get naked, they're definitely going to come, and after they come, the spell will be broken, and what will happen then?  
  
He gets an idea. 'Hold on,' Theo says, grabs Boris's pants by the waistband, and drags them, along with his shorts, down to his knees.  
  
Boris watches, wide eyed, breathing hard. 'What are you—'  
  
They've done this before, but not really. Not properly. Their teen antics were mainly confined to frotting and handjobs—anything further deemed too gay—but Theo definitely remembers one night, drunk and horny, they speculated between themselves about what a blowjob might actually _feel _like, and Boris suggested they find out, so they gave it a try. They didn't take it seriously enough to make it work; there was nervous laughter, and Boris trying to instruct Theo on technique, Theo threatening to bite Boris if he didn't shut the fuck up, and then when they switched, Boris complaining that it was disgusting and that his jaw hurt. The whole thing devolved into bickering and hilarity, and finally each of them jerking off just like usual.  
  
Theo can't be sure this is going to be better than then. He goes for it anyway.  
  
Boris rests a hand on Theo's cheek as Theo goes down, surprisingly gentle. Theo gags a bit before he figures it out, breathes through his nose. He tries to imitate what girls have done on him—grasping the base of the cock, jerking it and bobbing the head in tandem. It's trickier than he'd thought to keep the rhythm and the suction going at once, but he can feel Boris tensing, see a muscle jumping in his thigh, so he must be doing okay.  
  
Boris's hand falls away from Theo's face; he hears a soft rustling, and glances up to see that Boris has grabbed handfuls of the sheets, white-knuckled. His head has fallen back, eyes closed. There's a gleam of sweat along his forehead.  
  
A fresh wave of desire slams into Theo at the sight; he can't help making a tiny, strangled sound in his throat—which in turn has Boris jerking his hips, fucking his mouth deeper, and then Theo gags again and has to pull off for a second to regain his breath and equilibrium.  
  
'Sorry,' Boris says, voice quiet and strained, and then Theo goes down again: 'Oh, _fuck—_'  
  
He gets the hang of it eventually, but by then Boris's breathing is erratic, and it's maybe a minute before he's moaning, urgent cut-off little sounds that Theo recognizes as a warning. He pulls off, and jerks Boris the rest of the way, watching the way his mouth falls open as he comes all over his stomach.  
  
In the aftermath, Boris lays there useless, chest heaving, lashes fluttering, until Theo whacks him hard in the arm.  
  
'_Blyad__!_ The fuck was that?'  
  
'Don't you dare leave me hanging, you fuck.' Theo's shedding the last of his clothes. There's a large wet spot in the front of his briefs.  
  
Boris yawns. 'Well then, Potter, why not get up here—' He pats the bed next to him. 'Instead of throwing this big tantrum.'  
  
Theo crawls in next to him. He's expecting a lazy, bare-minimum handjob, which is why it's a surprise when Boris looks in his eyes, tenderly brushes a lock of hair from his face, and kisses him, lingering and sweet.  
  
Theo loses his breath, along with whatever is left of his mind, and lunges closer, deepening the kiss to something open-mouthed and sloppy, leaving spit on Boris's chin. The drag of his bare cock against Boris's thigh makes him hiss and shudder. He's so fucking close, he can feel it, he just needs, like, thirty seconds more—  
  
'Shh, shh, shh,' Boris chides, grabbing his hips and halting him. 'Settle down.'  
  
'Boris, please.' He barely recognizes the sound of his own voice, ragged and pleading. 'Please, I'm gonna—'  
  
'I have you,' Boris says soothingly. He grabs Theo's already pre-come-slick cock, a relief so intense Theo nearly sobs aloud.  
  
Somehow Boris knows, without being told, how close Theo is to sensory overload, and keeps his grasp loose, bringing him off with light strokes, kissing him gently all the while. Theo comes so hard he stops breathing and for a moment, he hears nothing apart from the rush of blood in his ears.  
  
Afterwards, Boris falls asleep, naked, stomach still tacky with come. Theo gets under the sheets and closes his eyes, but even though he's tired and drunk, adrenaline's still coursing through his veins. After a few minutes of tossing and turning, he gets up and puts his underwear on.  
  
There's still a couple of inches left in the bottle of Russian Standard. He pours himself a glass, and cracks open the window for a smoke. For one of the best rooms in the place, there isn't much of a view. Theo gazes down at the parking lot, rows and rows of glinting car roofs.  
  
The dull roar of city traffic is familiar and calming. Theo lets the sound envelop him. With his eyes closed, it feels almost as if nothing has changed.  
  
-  
  
An alarm goes off at some point in the early morning. Theo and Boris both ignore it. Then Boris's phone rings, and rings, and rings again, until Boris makes a tortured groan and finally picks up.  
  
'_Słucham_.'  
  
A short conversation in Polish ensues. Theo sits up, blinking sleep out of his eyes.  
  
'_Tak. W__ porządku__._' There's a beep as the call ends. Then Boris throws the phone back down on the bed and howls in anguish, 'Fucking _kurva_ motherfuck!'  
  
'What?'  
  
Theo must seem genuinely panicked, because Boris looks stricken. 'Oh, don't worry, not the end of the world. Just my friend calling to remind me to get up. I asked him because I knew I would sleep in. Hotel check-out is in an hour and still have things to pack.'  
  
'Shit.'  
  
'It will be fine.' Boris scratches at the dried come on his own stomach and makes a face. 'Okay if I shower first?'  
  
-  
  
Theo ends up helping Boris haul his luggage down the stairs to the lobby for a receptionist to stash in a locker. They share a hungover breakfast in the hotel restaurant, Theo taking shaky sips of black coffee, Boris cheerfully munching his 'egg and toasts'.  
  
'I have a few things to do today,' he says with his mouth full. 'So I'm afraid this will be it for us.'  
  
'But you're not leaving 'til later, right? Can I see you before you go?'  
  
Boris winces. 'Sorry. Wish there was time. Busy, busy.'  
  
There are a lot of things Theo wants to say, including but not limited to, _You don't have to go tonight,_ and_ You don't have to go ever_, and_ You don't have to run scams with your shady friends. You have money now. Why not give it up? Live here in New York City? Be with me?_ But he's pretty sure he knows how well that would go, so he stays quiet.  
  
They smoke a last cigarette together outside the building.  
  
'You'll come back soon?' Theo asks.  
  
'Of course,' Boris says, in a blandly genial way that means he has no idea when, if ever, he'll be back, then drops the cigarette butt and crushes it under his heel. 'I'll see you again, Potter. Don't worry about that.'  
  
'But—' _But what?_ He doesn't have anything to say.  
  
Boris's eyes soften as he looks at Theo again. 'I'll be thinking of you,' he says. Quick as a flash, he leans in and captures Theo's mouth in a brief, stinging kiss; and then he's gone.  
  
_Stay away from the ones you love too much_, Theo thinks, _those are the ones who will kill you. _With sudden, painful clarity, he understands Boris in a way he hadn't before.  
  
He watches the dark shape of Boris disappear from view, cigarette burning to ash in his hand.

**Author's Note:**

> In the novel, Theo asks Boris if he's likely to quit the drugs, and he says 'Live by the sword, die by the sword', hence the title. 
> 
> I am from the UK, but the wack-ness of Theo & Pippa texting in British was gonna kill me so I changed to American spellings. There are almost definitely still some inconsistencies. Sorry about that/feel free to correct. Also my deepest apologies to anyone from NYC.
> 
> I hope this wasn't terrible?! I'm [here](http://theo-decker.tumblr.com) on Tumblr if you want to scream at someone about upcoming Goldfinch movie. xxx


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